Public schools are k-12 and cover all classes.
English teachers are hired to assist in conversation parts of the curriculum.

There are darn few private schools and the majority of them require you to be a certified teacher in your home country.

Perhaps you were thinking of hagwons? They are AFTER SCHOOL academies teaching/tutoring in a variety of subjects and the are prolific in Korea. The vast majority of teachers in Korea work as English teachers in hagwons.

The average salary for an entry level teacher is about $1800-$2000 / month PLUS airfare, housing and possibly medical and pension benefits. Potential SAVINGS are in the range of $1000/month due to minimal living expenses beyond your food, beverages and entertainment.

Hagwons closing is a simple matter of economics and business viability. Those that can recruit and hold students survive. Those that cannot, do not.

IN both cases, simple supplies (books, whiteboard, markers, etc.) are "supplied". In both cases, largely, students do not want to be there.

4 and 5: sometimes yes, sometimes no. It varies widely and in the case of public schools depends on the current school administration (who change every 5 years (often sooner)).

6: there are but not for someone fresh off the plane with minimal qualifications (BA and TEFL). Prove yourself in the classroom (in the case of a hagwon) and it is negotiable. IN the case of public schools, the wage tiers are set in stone and if you meet the qualifications to move up to the next level you move up. They peak at just over $3000 (salary and overtime) plus benefits.

7: no. 10,000 schools and hagwons in Seoul and you don't qualify for top tier stuff (too new to the country). You'd be lucky to find any job in Seoul while sitting in Mexico. Better start thinking about the suburbs and satellite cities in Gyeonggi-do.

8: see #7

9: unless you speak/read/write Korean you won't be dealing with a school directly - especially not a public school (they all do their recruitment through recruiting agencies).

OP: Please don't take this the wrong way, but are you a native English-speaker and a citizen of one of 'the Big Seven" countries (Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, United Kingdom, United States)? If not, your chances of getting a job teaching English legally in South Korea are approximately zero.

As for supplies: Typically a classroom in Korean public schools will have a computer with internet connection, a projector or a large screen TV, a printer, access to photocopier, papers are plentiful, books in english aplenty (schools that I've taught or visited anyway), props for role-plays, boards games, etc. Unfortunately we don't have time to use them all, because we have to cover the textbook. Most of the time we can't even cover the textbook. I don't know about others but when students turn up without notebooks or pencils, I give them a new one. (and they discard that afterwards) Sometimes it is like the field of cloth of gold. OP, come to think of it, you might become disgusted by the decandence over here. China might be a better transition place.

Public schools are k-12 and cover all classes.
English teachers are hired to assist in conversation parts of the curriculum.

There are darn few private schools and the majority of them require you to be a certified teacher in your home country.

Perhaps you were thinking of hagwons? They are AFTER SCHOOL academies teaching/tutoring in a variety of subjects and the are prolific in Korea. The vast majority of teachers in Korea work as English teachers in hagwons.

The average salary for an entry level teacher is about $1800-$2000 / month PLUS airfare, housing and possibly medical and pension benefits. Potential SAVINGS are in the range of $1000/month due to minimal living expenses beyond your food, beverages and entertainment.

Hagwons closing is a simple matter of economics and business viability. Those that can recruit and hold students survive. Those that cannot, do not.

IN both cases, simple supplies (books, whiteboard, markers, etc.) are "supplied". In both cases, largely, students do not want to be there.

4 and 5: sometimes yes, sometimes no. It varies widely and in the case of public schools depends on the current school administration (who change every 5 years (often sooner)).

6: there are but not for someone fresh off the plane with minimal qualifications (BA and TEFL). Prove yourself in the classroom (in the case of a hagwon) and it is negotiable. IN the case of public schools, the wage tiers are set in stone and if you meet the qualifications to move up to the next level you move up. They peak at just over $3000 (salary and overtime) plus benefits.

7: no. 10,000 schools and hagwons in Seoul and you don't qualify for top tier stuff (too new to the country). You'd be lucky to find any job in Seoul while sitting in Mexico. Better start thinking about the suburbs and satellite cities in Gyeonggi-do.

8: see #7

9: unless you speak/read/write Korean you won't be dealing with a school directly - especially not a public school (they all do their recruitment through recruiting agencies).

- saying stop posting and start reading is out of line.
- please donīt bother responding again.
- Im very well read and iīm not 18 years old by a long shot.
- your comments tend to talk down to me.
- some simple basic info was what i was looking for.
- and for the record this was my first post about korea ever in my life.
- i have the right to ask questions as everyone does and seek information.
- i will continue to seek info and post as many times as i feel nessessary.
- keep negative comments away from this post and judgements.
- please donīt post here or to me again.

- saying stop posting and start reading is out of line.
- please donīt bother responding again.
- Im very well read and iīm not 18 years old by a long shot.
- your comments tend to talk down to me.
- some simple basic info was what i was looking for.
- and for the record this was my first post about korea ever in my life.
- i have the right to ask questions as everyone does and seek information.
- i will continue to seek info and post as many times as i feel nessessary.
- keep negative comments away from this post and judgements.
- please donīt post here or to me again.

I'm not the biggest fan of the general atmosphere at Dave's either, but ttompatz has a point. He just gave you some incredibly useful information (which you actually could have found yourself with a simple Google search). It seems like you posted up your resume without doing the basic research... That's not the wisest move.

- Saying "Stop posting and start reading" is out of line.
- Please don't bother responding again.
- I'm very well read, and I'm not 18 years old by a long shot.
- Your comments tend to talk down to me.
- Some simple basic info was what I was looking for.
- (deleted: and) For the record, this was my first post about Korea ever in my life.
- I have the right to ask questions and seek information as everyone does (deleted: and seek information).
- I will continue to seek info and post as many times as I feel nessessary.
- Keep negative comments and judgments away from this post (deleted: and judgements).
- Please don't post here or to me again.

I suggest that, before you think about becoming an English teacher, you should brush up on your basic writing mechanics and sentence structure.

Seriously, though, this is a forum for English teachers. Not all of us are lifelong TESOL/EFL professionals, but for those of us who are, it is somewhat insulting for someone with obviously limited composition skills to assume we will have no problem pointing them to the best jobs in the country when there are qualified people with advanced degrees in teaching or language studies who are looking for them.

1. is it normal for public schools to pay about $2,000 dollars per month?
I thought it was more.

2000 US a month is the median wage for Native English Teachers. Keep in mind you get a free apartment which makes the wage considerably higher and also the school pays half of your retirement that is paid to the government and you can get it all back in the end at your convenience. The school also pays half of your medical insurance. In addition you don't pay any Korean taxes for the first two years and there is no US taxes you will have to pay for your foriegn salary.

esl4everever wrote:

3. i would like supplies to work with. and I would like students who want to be there. would that be more public or private?

For Public schools, some will want to be there most will not. As for Hogwans, the students will be there because thier parents want them to be there, not necessarily because the student wants to be there. Also with Hagwons you will in many cases have no protection against unreasonable parents and students that are just plain piggish and rotten.

esl4everever wrote:

4. do public or private schools have more supplies available?

Public schools will have more supplies because Hagwons are for sheer profit only and they will be miserly on the supplies.

esl4everever wrote:

5. are public or private better for new teachers?

Public schools are safer and better, however you usually have to have experience working at public schools.

esl4everever wrote:

6. are there public and or private schools out there that pay $3,000 usd per month or is that totally made up?

None in Korea that I have heard of. I think even International schools in Korea do not pay that kind of a wage. You would have to have lots of experience to get into a Korean K-12 International School (5 years or more).

I will respond no more.
Nor will I read more from this post.
Some good points have come out and some points were out of line.
Either way the atmosphere has the feeling of an underlined attack on individuals for simply posting questions.
Iīve been reading information about Korea for about 2 years.
No one should be denyed posting individual quesitons they may have.
This post should be locked.

OP, ttompatz is never rude or mean and I don't think he/she (he?) meant to come off that way. Generally he holds a neutral standpoint and just answers questions straightforwardly. He was just stating that a lot of that information that you asked you could find online or on this board by searching. I don't think there was any hostility coming from that.

I think a lot of the reason people lashed out against you and got kind of offended by your post is because we are very sensitive about the job situation here. It has gotten considerably worse in the past few years, and to hear someone who is completely new come here and ask "What are the top 5 schools in Seoul I should be contacting?" it sounds a bit presumptuous and conceited since there are a lot of us here who are qualified (not myself included, I don't have a Masters degree or a teaching license but I do have experience and certifications) who can't find jobs at even one of the top 20 or 30 schools in the city. Seoul is really huge so even the top 100 or 200 would be good places to work, you know what I mean? There are over one hundred universities in the Seoul area alone... forget about trying to count all the public schools, private schools, hagwons, and other types of employers.

I know that you didn't mean to be presumptuous or conceited and were only trying to seek out the best information to help yourself in a positive way, but I'm just telling you that's why people didn't treat you with respect in this thread. You were asking basic questions about jobs and then asked to be directed to the top schools in the top city in the top country for ESL in the world.

Coming from Mexico with a BA and TEFL, the best job you can get is at a public school in Gyeonggi-do through GEPIK starting at 2.0 million won, and the best job you could get with just a BA and no TEFL would be a decent (after lots and lots of time searching for a decent one) hagwon starting at 2.1, MAYBE 2.2 if you stress your experience in Mexico. I would recommend against hagwons and take the lower pay at a public school since they are much better, more stable, more reliable, and more serious employers. The pay is lower but you are also teaching considerably less classes. If you get a public school with overtime classes every week like mine, you will be making way more than a hagwon pays and teaching way less hours than they require. The maximum amount of hours without overtime at a public school is 22 and the maximum amount of hours without overtime at a hagwon is 30. That's the difference of two whole work days at a public school! Teaching thirty, fifty minute classes a week is really, really exhausting. A lot of hagwons are jokes and I never felt like a real teacher at one, but I do feel like a real teacher who is taken seriously at my public school.

Anyway, good luck with your job search. I suggest applying to GEPIK through Korvia, GMSC, or another recruiter who recruits for GEPIK.

Last edited by thebektionary on Wed Nov 21, 2012 5:59 pm; edited 1 time in total